La Raza! Why a Chicano Party? Why Chicano Studies?

y A Chicano Party?
y Chicano Studies?

'Gonzales ©Isabel
•Froben Lozada •Aaron

The first selection in this pamphlet is reprinted from the March 13,
1970, issue of The Militant, and the second from The Militant of
January 23, 1970.

Manufactured in the United States of America
First Printing, March, 1970

Second Printing, July, 1970

A MERIT PAMPHLET

Pathfinder Press, Inc.
873 Broadway
New York, New York 10003

THE LIBRARY

Southwest Texas SU-> ■ .■\ifi , 3lty
San Marcos, Texas

Why a Chicano Party?

On Nov. 13-14, 1969, a symposium
on Chicano liberation was held at Cali-
fornia State College, Hay ward. Spon-
sored by the college's La Raza orga-
nization, the symposium was attended
by 500 students, most of whom were
Chicanos.

On the second evening of the sympo-
sium, a panel discussion on the forma-
tion of a Chicano political party took
place. A transcript of that discussion
follows, abridged and edited in the in-
terests of readability (elimination of
repetitions, etc.).

Participants in the discission were:

Armando Valdez (Chairman) - Di-
rector of La Causa, on Oakland, Calif,
Chicano distribution center.

Roger Alvarado- Activist and leader
in the San Francisco State student strike
led by the Third World Liberation
Front in 1968-69. He is also active in
the defense of Los Siete de la Raza,
seven San Francisco Latinos fighting
frame-up charges for their political
ideas and work in the community.

Aaron Manganilla- Formerly acoun-
selor in the College Readiness Program
at the College of San Mateo, Calif, he
is presently helping to organize Vence-
remos College in Redwood City, Calif.
He has long been an organizer of op-
position to the war in Vietnam.

Antonio Mo ndragon - Bay Area rep-
resentative of Reis Tijerina's Alianza
Movement in New Mexico. He is the
director of El Centro de la Raza at
California State College, Hayward.

Antonio Camejo - Formerly an in-
structor in the Chicano Studies pro-
gram at Merritt College in Oakland,
Calif. He is the candidate of the Social-
ist Workers Party for Superintendent
of Public Instruction in California.

Fro ben Lozada - Chairman of the
Latin American Studies Department at
Merritt College. He is the SWP candi-
date for attorney general of California.

Isabel Hernandez - Member of the
Chicano Student Union at Chabot Col-
lege, Hayward, Calif.

Rodolfo "Corky" Gonzales - Chairman
of the Denver Crusade for Justice.

Armando Valdez: We're going to get
into a dialogue now on what Corky
[Gonzales] proposed last night, that is,
on the formation of a Chicano political
party and on sending delegates to a
national conference in early spring. For
those of you who were not here last
night, there was some question raised
about the Democratic Party, and wheth-
er we would support Cesar Chavez if
he ran for office in the Democratic Party
or in any traditional party in the exist-
ing system.

The first brother said that if Chavez
ran for governor of California in an
independent political party, in opposi-
tion to the existing Republican and
Democratic parties, that he would be
in full support of Chavez.

When I spoke, I had an ideological
difference with that. 1 said that if we
did not have either the time or the ex-
pertise within a given time limit to de-
velop an independent Chicano political
party, that my support as a Chicano
would go to Chavez, knowing that the
racists in this state would never support
him and knowing that he would be a
formidable opposition to the type of
platform that Alioto [mayor of San
Francisco) and Unruh [main contender
for Democratic Party gubernatorial
nomination] have for us, and that if in
fact there were no third party, and
Chavez chose to run within the Demo-
cratic structure, that this would at least
give political attention to the Chicanos.

This is my position at this time. I
still feel that we need a separate, inde-
pendent party that will be the voice of
the Chicano people, without the sup-
posed Chicanos like those who are
i Gov. J Reagan's aides, or the type of
guys that are just tio-tacoing all around
and claiming to represent us. We need
independence. And the same thing goes
in the formation of a Chicano college.
The same thing is inherent in self-deter-
mination for all nations and all people.
But, my position is that Chavez run-
ning would be at least enough of an
opposition to focus attention on the
Chicano movement and give us a polit-

ical platform from which to speak.

Antonio Camejo: In my opinion, the
most important, in fact, the key task of
revolutionaries in the United States to-
day is to break the political monopoly
that the ruling class has on politics in
this country. For over 70 years the
ruling class in this country has oper-
ated the Democratic and Republican
parties uninterruptedly and without op-
position. And during these 70 years,
every time an election came up there
would be people who would say, "Now
is not the time to break away. I agree
with you that we should have our own
party, but now is not the time. We must
continue to support one of the two main
parties; if we don't the worst one of the
two — the greater evil — will get elected."

If you look back over history, this
has been the traditional argument. But
the most important thing that can be
done in this country, the most impor-
tant thing that La Raza can do, is to
organize itself independently politically
from the Democratic and Republican
parties.

Now, let me comment on what it
would mean if Chavez ran as a Demo-
crat. It would mean that he would be
saying to Chicanos and La Raza com-
munity that we should look to the Dem-
ocratic Party to solve our problems,
that we can win changes through sup-
porting the Democratic Party, that we
can make changes this way and get
our freedom.

What is the Democratic Party? It is a
political instrument of the people who
own and control this country, the peo-
ple who are fighting the war in Viet-
nam, the people who make profits by
oppressing us, by the super-exploita-
tion of our people. That is what the
Democratic Party is. To run in the Dem-
ocratic Party means that you are going
to tell people to register in the Democra-
tic Party and to vote in the primaries,
it means that you are going to orient
people toward supporting that party.

Once you start telling people that it's
OK to support the party because you're
running in it, there's a logic to that.
They're going to start saying, "Well,
what about this other liberal who says
ill. same things you say? What about
Itlfl I fnruh, because he's not eating
vrftpM thli month) shall wu support

hi in V M..U ii In ml .Mini (i if he comes out

with a few liberal statements in the cam-
paign, shall we support him? How
about Cranston [U.S. Senator from
California] who is a big supporter of
the grape strike, should we support
him? He's a Democrat like you, Cha-
vez."

You see, it's not just a matter of sup-
porting La Raza, it's not just a matter
of Chavez being part of La Raza and
we should support him, but what direc-
tion is he pointing in for our people to
follow? Is it a correct direction that is
going to win results and advance the
revolution? Or is he pointing us in a
direction that is going to lead us into
the same dead end that people have
been struggling to get out of for the
last 70 years?

Aaron Manganilla: It's very difficult
for me to comment on Tony's analysis
because I don't think that we are carry-
ing on a debate. And I am in whole-
hearted support and agreement with
everything he says. And I imagine you
are wondering, "Then why are you talk-
ing at all?" The point is that I think
now the only difference between us is
a point of priorities, that is, that in fact
there has not been enough of a voice
for the Chicano people; and I guess
that what I'm saying is that we need
mass media, publicity. And that can be
highly criticized, and I can sense it even
as I speak of it. But we need some type
of voice to be heard.

I'm not saying that it's not the right
time to change, God sakes it's way past
time! That's not my argument. Mine
was just a differentiation of political
priorities and revolutionary priorities.

I already have a difference with Cha-
vez but, you see, it is very difficult to
go up to La Raza and say, "John Ken-
nedy, Bob Kennedy and Ted Kennedy
are all pigs," — and that's what they
were and still are. At the same time
they're shaking hands with Chavez, and
saying "boycott grapes," these were the
same guys that were getting McNamara
into the Defense Department, and that
were getting more anymore grapes sent
to Vietnam. I understand that they were
pigs, that they were the ones that started
that process that has continued through
the Democratic and Republican parries.

My whole emphasis is that we need a

political voice at this point. And Cesar
Chavez seems to be in that position. It
is a question of priorities; we need that
voice even if it means supporting Cha-
vez in the Democratic Party. We want
the masses of people to begin to under-
stand that we're supporting him as a
voice of the Chicano and not giving
credence or righteousness to any type
of solidarity or unity with the Demo-
crats.

Roger Alvarado: I think it is impor-
tant for us to understand that when we
are talking about a political party,
what we are talking about is having
real political power, having real au-
thority to direct our lives in the way
that we want to. I think that for us to
talk about having the same kinds of
things the Anglos have in this country
is bullshit. I think for us to talk about
being Democrats or Republicans or re-
lating to the electoral system the way it
is now, is nothing but a waste of our
people's time.

I think that if we are going to talk
about change, then we are going to
have to talk about revolutionary change,
a total change in our society, a total
change in this economy, a total change
in the political structure, a total change
so that people have direct participa-
tion in those institutions that control
their lives, and not just a few people
of a privileged minority.

We are going to have to relate to the
fact that we are going to have to de-
velop our own organization, our own
principles for that organization. And
if we need mass contact, if we need
publications, if we need contact through
television, through radio, then it falls
upon the people to develop that type
of communication.

We can't go to NBC, we can't go to
ABC, we can't go to CBS, we can't
go to any one of these lying dogs and
ask them to let us use their machinery
so that we can tell our people that this
system is no good. Those people make
their money off this system. Those peo-
ple have those kinds of machines be-
cause they live within the context of
the capitalist system which exploits us.
We cannot go to our exploiters and
ask them to let us use their machines
so that we can tell the rest of our broth-

ers and sisters that the machines are
exploiting us, because they are in the
hands of the exploiters. It's ridiculous
to talk in this kind of a context.

We have to realize that our needs as
a people can only be resolved by us,
because only we understand what the
needs are, because we are the ones that
have them. And if we are going to deal
with those needs, then we must organize
our own political structure, we must
organize our own means for attaining
power, and we must be prepared at all
times to defend that organization with
whatever is necessary. We can no long-
er wait, and talk in terms of things
like the Republican and Democratic par-
ties, we have to talk in terms of where
we are now and what the reality of
a political party for our people is at
this point. If we can't relate to a po-
litical party as a people, then we need
to relate to some other kind of orga-
nization.

We have to quit bullshitting each
other and quit playing the Man's ver-
bal games and realize that any time
that we relate to each other as orga-
nizations or as individuals we are talk-
ing about brothers' and sisters' lives.
They are taking our brothers to Viet-
nam and they are raping our sisters
in the streets. They are murdering us
wherever they want to. And we aren't
doing anything about it. If it's a party
that will stop them, then it's a party
that we need. If it's some other kind of
organization that's going to stop them,
then that's what we need. Not some
kind of verbal dialogue that doesn't
have anything to do with anybody any-
where.

Isabel Hernandez: I agree with Mr.
Alvarado. It's great to talk about be-
ing revolutionary, you know. It's great
for college students who are aware of
what's going on, who know we've been
exploited. But we have to think in terms
of people in the barrio and tell them
"you've been exploited" in terms they
can understand, not in terms of big
words, big theories, but in terms of
they arc paying three times as much
as somebody else in the super mar kei,
in terms of their kids not getting a de-
cent education, in terms of them getting
decent jobs.

How do you do this? One of the

problems is that a lot of Chicano peo-
ple are not citizens. This presents the
problem of whether it is worth it to
become a citizen and work within the
system, or to find an alternative. In
terms of voting, traditionally the Chi-
cano, the Latin people, have been very
suspicious of politics because they have
always been sold out.

The next point is that it's going to
take a lot of work if you're going to
make a political party. We're going
to raise the people, inform the people,
inform ourselves, so we can be effective.
We're going to show the Anglos, we're
going to show everybody, that we have
to move on. We have to stop the ex-
ploitation, we have to have personal
contact with the people in the barrio,
not sitting up in the colleges and rap-
ping and theorizing, talking about rev-
olution, but we also have to go to the
barrio and tell people where it's at.

Antonio Mondragon: I would like to
present this in the form of a question, a
rhetorical question if you want. We are
looking at reality, we have been seeing
where the injustice in this country, which
has been hidden from the eyes of the
people, really lies. But, there is another
point. It seems to me, that if we started
a political party according to the view
of the socialist as spoken, we might
alienate many of the people from the
Crusade for Justice, the Alianza, the
Huelga people, because, how many so-
cialist Chicanos are there now in the
Bay Area? Socialist with a capital S?

Antonio Camejo: My conception of an
independent Chicano political party is
not that it has to be socialist or have a
socialist program. It probably will de-
velop a socialist program as the revo-
lution approaches, but this will not be
the case at the beginning. Socialists will,
of course, be in the forefront of building
the Chicano party, because this would
represent a major break with the system
and would be a giant step forward for
the people. We would be active members
of a Chicano party, and I, for example,
would be proud to run as a candidate
of such a party. But, there would also
Ik- large numbers of people in the party
who have not yet been convinced of so-
cialism, and who will only become con-
vinivd as a rcsull ol (lie struggle.

Do you want me to develop that? OK.
Let me deal with some of these prob-
lems involved in building a party. First
of all, an independent Chicano political
party would not just run in elections. I
think Roger Alvarado makes an ex-
tremely important point about elections.
We cannot get into the bag of the Peace
and Freedom Party which just brought
a whole bunch of liberals and radicals
together for the purpose of running in
an election. The Peace and Freedom
Party was an electoral coalition, noth-
ing else. The day after the election, it
fell apart. You never heard anything
from them after that. And you're prob-
ably going to begin to hear from them
again, because another election is com-
ing up. They end up doing nothing ex-
cept miseducating the people about
what is really needed. 1 would be op-
posed to this type of formation.

An independent Chicano political par-
ty would not just take part in elections,
but it would also have to engage itself
in the day-to-day struggle of our peo-
ple. It would have to be a party which
would lead such things as campus
struggles, that could participate in help-
ing to form the Chicano studies depart-
ments around the entire Southwest and
the entire country wherever La Raza
happens to be. It would be a political
party that would participate in mass
demonstrations over different issues in
the community, in the schools, for hous-
ing, against the war. It would be the
type of organization, for example, that
would do the kind of things that the
Crusade for Justice has been doing. It
would do this as well as participate in
electoral activity.

The point I am making about the
Democratic and Republican parties is
the following: that in my opinion it is a
principle, a revolutionary principle,
and in the tradition of Emiliano Zapa-
ta, you know, who said, "I will die a
slave to principles, never to men," that
you do not support those people who
are oppressing you. Principles are im-
portant, and if you have incorrect prin-
ciples, you cannot majfe a revolution.

It's a principle that you do not sup-
port those people who are oppressing
you. That's a principle In my opinion.
I refuse to support in any way the peo-
ple who are responsible for my oppres-
sion. Now, in terms of elections, how-

ever, it would be incorrect for us to take
the attitude that since we know that the
electoral system in this country is a
farce, since we know that the Republi-
can and Democratic parties play a con
game, since we know that you cannot
make a revolution through elections,
since we know that we are not going to
take power in this country through elec-
tions, that therefore we don't participate
in them. That would be a mistake.

The history of the revolutions
throughout the world have shown that
it is a tactical question whether you
participate in elections, and how you
participate in them. Lenin, for instance,
in the Bolshevik Party, which made the
first socialist revolution in the world,
participated in elections. Fidel Castro
ran in elections. The point is this, that
even though we understand the whole
question about electoral politico the
community does not. The majority of
La Raza does not know the role that the
Democratic Party plays, therefore it is
our task to be able to reach them on
this.

Elections are a tactic that can be used
by revolutionaries to be able to reach
the people, and to be able to organize
the people. For instance, by running in
elections you can get on television. It's
incorrect to say that they won't let you
on. An example of this is Paul Boutelle,
who is a revolutionary Black national-
ist and a socialist, who got on a half
hour of national network time on the
Joey Bishop show, where he got up
there and rapped about how rotten this
system is, how decadent it is, and why
we have to have a socialist revolution.

How was he able to do this? Because
there is a law which says you have to
give candidates who are running for
office equal time on radio and TV, and
Paul Boutelle was runnning on the So-
cialist Workers Party ticket. Sure they
try to take this time away from us.
They try to maneuver in every way
they can. But, we fought back against
them, we were right up there with our
lawyers, and said, "Nothing doing,
you've got Nixon up there, you've got
Humphrey up there, we're going to talk
for a half hour too." And they had to
give it to us. We fought for it legally
and we won that.

Now, we're going to do the same

thing in the state of California with the
election campaign coming up. We're
running as revolutionary socialists in
this campaign to reach thousands of
people with our ideas and educate them
about the needs of the people in this
state. We are also running our cam-
paign as an example of the type of
thing that can be done if Brown people
organize their own party. And we will
be campaigning in favor of building a
Chicano party. And if an independent
Chicano party were formed in this state,
we would be supporting it and building
it. There is a tremendous potential for
building such a party. We can do it. We
can go in and talk to our people. We
can win them over.

Let me say something about what we
can do. It's true we are a minority, but
the Democratic Party in the state of Cal-
ifornia can only win if the Chicanos
vote for it. Think of that. We have the
potential to wipe it off the face of the
map as a political institution. And on
a national scale, in alliance with Black
people, we have the power to make it
impossible for the Democratic Party to
win another election in this country.
Just think of what this means. We have
the power to turn the political structure
in this country upside down and inside
out.

Now, what does that mean? Does that
mean that the Republican Party would
always run the country, and that we
then would be worse off? The Demo-
cratic Party wins an election because it
is supported by a coalition of the labor
movement, Brown and Black people,
and other Third World people, Native
Americans, Asian Americans.

The labor movement, which includes
white racist workers — and they are ra-
cist— support the Democratic Party for
two reasons: 1) they think the Demo-
cratic Party can produce on their de-
mands and 2) they think the Democratic
Party can win. However, if it can be
proved that the Democratic Party can-
not win another election, they would
have to rethink their whole strategy.
This is especially significant in terms of
the radicalization in this country, where
the Democratic Party is being exposed
as the party of the Vietnam war, and
where more and more people are begin-
ning to see more clearly that the Demo-

cratic Party is not fulfilling their needs,

And, you know, the American work-
ers have been indoctrinated for 30
years that the Republican Party is their
arch enemy. And it would be difficult
for the ruling class in this country to
turn around and say, "Now you've got
to support the Republicans." The whole
question of who the workers should
support would be much more open to
question and discussion. And those peo-
ple within the labor movement who be-
lieve the workers should organize a
labor party in their own interest, inde-
pendent of the Republicans and Demo-
crats, would get a much better hearing.

The point is that the formation of a
Chicano party could help to change the
whole political relationship of forces,
and could help set an example for other
people who want to fight oppression,
for Black people, for people in the labor
movement who are for organizing an
independent political power.

At the same time we would be driving
wedges into the majority population,
breaking them up. You know how the
ruling class maintains their position,
how they divide and rule. Well, in a
revolutionary struggle the smartest
thing to do is to take your enemy and
break him up, drive wedges into him,
break off sections of the majority, and
win alliances for yourself, and then
your minority becomes larger and larg-
er until it is no longer a minority but
through alliances becomes a majority.
That's the tactic that we can use in
terms of building a political party.

If we don't take this step, if we don't
use our political power, we will never
get anything but crumbs. We will be
guaranteed tokenism, and we will lose
struggle after struggle. And let me end
on Chavez. It's true that he would be
able to talk to a lot of people, and tell
the truth about the grape strike and tell
about the oppression of La Raza. It's
true that he would be able to do those
things. But, that's not the key thing.
He would be doing a disservice to the
entire movement in this country because
he would be miseducating people about
the crying need to break w r ith the Dem-
ocratic Party. He would be miseducat-
ing people, and it's a lot harder to edu-
cate people after they've been misedu-
cated about what is necessary.

It's like driving a stick shift for 30
years, and then trying to switch to an
automatic. You end up having an acci-
dent because you keep pushing the
clutch down, and there's no clutch there.
That type of miseducation makes it
harder to eventually form an indepen-
dent Chicano party. It would make it
harder for us to talk about a Chicano
party if Chavez was at the same time
campaigning and registering people in
the Democratic Party. And the truth of
the matter is that this has already been
tried again and again and nothing has
come from it.

Malcolm X made a very strong state-
ment on this. He said, "Anyone who
supports the Democratic Party after its
record of oppression, and what it has
done to our people, is not only a fool,
but a traitor to his race."

Froben Lozada; Concerning brother
Roger's view of the Peace and Freedom
Party, [Earlier in the evening Roger
Alvarado had raised the issue of not
wanting an organization similar to the
Peace and Freedom Party because of its
failure,] I will have to disagree with him
on that, because to me, that's not a po-
litical party. I mean you don't have a
serious political party when you have
so much disagreement within that party
that they could not even decide who
their vice- presidential candidate would
be, much less carry out any effective
actions.

Another thing is that there are many
activities and actions which help lead to
the revolution, which help to organize
people independent of the ruling class,
but which are not revolutionary in
themselves, and which involve many
people who are not yet consciously rev-
olutionary.

An example of this was the San Fran-
cisco State strike which Roger Alvarado
helped to lead. To me, the strike was
not the same thing as a revolution, but
it was a step in the process of struggle,
it was a tool through which people be-
came politically educated in the process
of struggle. Through Actions such as
these you organize people to fight for
the needs of the community, and you
raise the level of consciousness of the
people. The same thing goes for a polit-
ical party. It can also be used as a tool.

Corky Gonzales: I reserved getting
involved in some of the sensitive issues
here. There are so many things that go
through my mind, I know I can't make
a short statement and really answer the
questions raised, for example, the ques-
tions raised by the young ladies who
took their positions up here. [At the
beginning of the session a demand was
made to have women be represented on
the panel and two women, including
Isabel Hernandez, were seated.] I've
many thoughts on that line as I men-
tioned here last night, and I might men-
tion a few of them here again today.

We understand and realize after hav-
ing been involved in many kinds of
movements, what the strength of a
woman is, and what her strength is to
the movement. We also recognize,
watching many of our college students
here, one of the things that the young
lady said at the end of the table, that
we can intellectualize and we can rap,
but that we must also get down to the
grass roots. Which comes to the use of
the tools which Froben mentioned here,
which comes to the question of how do
we start this political party?

Before 1 get into that though, I want
to get back to the women's situation,
not to get into an argument, because I
don't want one unless we have an hour
and a half or two hours. I want to say
only this: That one of the problems that
I see, as one of the grass roots people
that came out of the barrios, as some-
one who worked in the fields, is that I
recognize too much of an influence of
white European thinking in the discus-
sion. I hope that our Chicana sisters
can understand that they can be front
runners in the revolution, they can be
in the leadership of any social move-
ment, but I pray to God that they do
not lose their Chicanisma or their wom-
anhood and become a frigid gringa.
So I'm for equality, but still want to see
some sex in our women.

So I want to rap, I want to tell you
about some of the things we feel. I
think that Tony Camejo hit on some
very important points that we should
analyze. I mentioned last night that we
have to stop falling in the same old
traps, stop being affected by the same
commercial stuff that the majority of
this idiotic society is believing — like the

fact that if you used enough Hai-Karatc
you would have so many women after
you that you would have to walk over
a mattress of women to get the one you
want. You know this is the type of thing
that brainwashes the whole community.
So we have to understand that all these
false ideas they have put before us are
illusions. That these false ideas are the
same ones they have always used to
control. The symbol of Anglo superior-
ity has got to be destroyed. And the
burden of Chicano inferiority has got
to be destroyed. So, in doing these
things, we want to control and develop
our own leadership, and to politicize
people — not just make politicians — but
to make people aware and teach them.
This has got to come through actions,
not words. We understand that.

I don't want to get involved in dis-
cussing personality, But, because I'm
very nationalistic, I'm very glad to
hear Tony Camejo say that if we had
a Chicano party, he would be willing
to run as a Chicano in the Chicano
party. I'm very proud of that and very
thankful that he said that, realizing that
his expertise and his professionalism,
his brains, can be utilized within the
Chicano community to help create that
liberation that's important. Not to be
dominated by white society that has set
up every type of political party that
exists today.

You know we had communalism and
socialism hundreds of years before the
white man ever hit these shores. And so
did many of the other countries that
were occupied but not "discovered" until
the gringo got there with a cross and a
gun.

Now we want to talk about how we
are going to create action in the people.
What are the common denominators
that unite the people? The key common
denominator is nationalism. When I
talk about nationalism, some people
run around in their intellectual bags,
and they say this is reverse racism. The
reverse of a racist is a humanitarian. I
specifically mentioned what I felt na-
tionalism was. Nationalism becomes la
familia. Nationalism comes first out of
the family, then into tribalism, and then
into the alliances that are necessary to
lift the burden of all suppressed human-
ity.

Now, if you try to climb up a stair-
way, you have to start with the first

8 l e ?;. Y 2 U Can,t jump from the bottom
of this floor to the top of those bleach-
ers, If you can, then you must be"super-
machor (I don't taik about super-man. )
But you can't, so you start using those
tools that are necessary to get from the
bottom to the top. One of these tools is
nationalism. You realize that if Chavez
or any popular figure in the Mexicand
scene decides to run, and if he ran for
any party, as popular as he is, then out
of nationalism we would even vote for
an idiot. If his name was Sanchez if
nis name was Gonzalez, you would
walk in and vote for him, whether you
know him or not, because you are na-
tionalistic. And we have elected too
many idiots in the past out of nation-
alism, right?

Now, let's take that common denomi-
nator, that same organizing tool of na-
tionalism, and utilize it to work against
the system. Let's use it to work against
the two parties that I say are like an
animal with two heads eating out of
the same trough, that sits on the same
boards of directors of the banks and
corporations, that shares in the same
industries that make dollars and profits
off wars. To fight this thing, you look
for the tools.

Now, if Tony is a socialist, if my
brother here is an independent, if my
sister is a Republican - she might hit
me later -if one of the others is a Dem-
ocrat and one is a communist, and one
from the Socialist Labor Party, what
do we have in common politically?
Nothing. We've been fighting over par-
ties across the kitchen table, wives are
Republicans and husbands are Demo-
crats, sometimes, and we argue over a
bunch of garbage. And the same Re-
publicans and Democrats are having
cocktails together at the same bar and
playing golf together and kissing each
other behind the scenes.

So you tell me then, what is the com-
mon denominator that will touch the
barrio, the campos and the ranckitos 1 ?
Are we going to go down there with
some tremendous words of intellectual-
ism which they cannot relate to, when
they relate on the level of, "We need
food. We need health care for our chil-
dren. I need someone to go down to

juvenile court with my son. There is no
job for my husband," And the revolu-
tion of 15 or 20 years from now is not
going to feed a hungry child today.

So what is the common denominator
we use? It is nationalism. If someone
wants to turn around and say "That's
a cultural bag," I tell them to go to
hell. Because I know one thing— in our
group we have dropped all the parlia-
mentary procedure bullshit, we dropped
all the gringo type of government, and
we have a concilia de la familia. And a
seven-year-old boy can get up and
make his ideas heard and can influence
a change that everyone else agrees with.

A woman who influences her old
man only under the covers or when
they are talking over the table, and
then he goes in -if it's a bad idea- and
argues for that, because he's strong
enough to carry it through, is doing
a disservice to La Causa. Any woman
can influence a man whether she is
weak or strong. So it's better for her to
bnng it out in the concilio and then all
of us can take it and evaluate it as to
whether it's right or wrong, good or
bad.

All right, how do we start this"? We
start it and call it an independent Chi-
cano political organization. We can use

vnZ T ° ny mentioned aiso. under the
fOC code, we can use it as a forum
to preach and teach. We can gain the
same amount of radio and TV time
as any phony candidate. We proved
it in Colorado. I ran for mayor as
an independent, and I campaigned two
weeks. Two weeks, because we were
busy directing a play and busy in civil
rights actions. But, we had the same
amount of time on TV as anybody
else, and on radio. We were able to
start to politicize people. We were able
to start to tell about an idea. We were
able, even, to sue the mayor and the
top candidates for violating the city
charter, for spending more money than
the city provided for under its consti-
tution. We had that mayor and the most
powerful Republicans and Democrats
sitfing on their asses-down in the court-
room. Our method was to take them
to court, to take them to task, to show
the public that they were corrupt And
we proved that they were liars, over
and over again.

0

We must start off by creating the
structure — the concilio — by calling a
congress sometime this spring, bring-
ing together all those people that be-
lieve that it can be done. We under-
stand that when we organize in an
area where we are a majority, we can
control. Where we are a minority, we
will be a pressure group. And we will
be a threat.

We understand the need to take ac-
tion in the educational system. We un-
derstand that we need actions such as
the "blow-outs," because the youth are
not afraid of anything. Because the
youth are ready to move. The whole
party will be based on the actions of
the young, and the support of the old.

Secondly, in the communities where
we are a majority, we can then con-
trol and start to reassess taxes, to start
charging the exploiters for what they
have made off our people in the past.
You can also incorporate, the commu-
nity to drive out the exploiters, to make
them pay the freight for coming into the
community, and sign your own fran-
chises. You can de-annex a commu-
nity as easily as they annex a barrio
and incorporate it. You can create your
own security groups, and place a gun
here to protect the people, not to harass
them, but to protect them from the Man
who is going to come in from the out-
side. You can also create your own
economic base by starting to understand
that we can share instead of cut each
others' throats.

Now what are the tools? We said
nationalism, which means that we have
to be able to identify with our past,
and understand our past, in order that
we can dedicate ourselves to the future,
dedicate ourselves to change. And we
have to understand what humanism
really is. We can tie the cultural thing
into it, but we also have to tie in the
political and the economic. We tie these
things together, and we start to use the
common denominator of nationalism.

Now for those Anglo supporters,
don't get up- tight. For the Black broth-
ers, they are practicing the same thing
right now. And we understand it and
respect it. And we are for meaningful
coalitions with organized groups.

We have to start to consider our-
selves as a nation. We can create a con-
gress or a concilio. We can understand
that we are a nation of Aztlan. We can
understand and identify with Puerto
Rican liberation. We understand and
identify with Black liberation. We can
understand and identify with white lib-
eration from this oppressing system
once we organize around ourselves.

Where they have incorporated them-
selves to keep us from moving into
their neighborhoods, we can also in-
corporate ourselves to keep them from
controlling our neighborhoods. We
have to also understand economic rev-
olution, of driving the exploiter out.
We have to understand political change.
And we have to understand principle.
And the man who says we can do it
within the system — who says, "Honest,
you can, look at me, I have a $20,000-
a-year job" — he's the man who was
last year's militant and this year's OEO
employee [Office of Economic Oppor-
tunity], And now he's keeping his mouth
shut and he ain't marching any more.
We have to understand that he is not
a revolutionary, that he's a counter-
revolutionary. He's not an ally, he be-
comes an enemy because he's contami-
nated.

You can't walk into a house full of
disease with a bottle full of mercuro-
chrome and cure the disease without
getting sick yourself. That's what we
say about the lesser of the two evils.
If four grains of arsenic kill you, and
eight grains of arsenic kill you, which
is the lesser of two evils? You're dead
either way.

We have to understand that libera-
tion comes from self-determination, and
to start to use the tools of nationalism
to win over our barrio brothers, to
win over the brothers who are still be-
lieving that machismo means getting
a gun and going to kill a communist
in Vietnam because they've been jived
about the fact that they will be accepted
as long as they go get themselves killed
for the gringo captain; who still think
that welfare is giving them something
and don't understand that the one who
is administering the welfare is the one
that's on welfare, because, about 90
percent of the welfare goes into admin-

istrauon; and who still do not under-
stand that the war on poverty is against
the poor, to keep them from reacting
have to win these brothers over
and we have to do it by action. Wheth-
er it be around police brutality, the
educational system, whether if be
against oppression of any kind -you
create an action, you create a blow-out
and you see how fast those kids get
politicized. Watch how fast they learn
the need to start to take over our own
communities. And watch how fast thev
earn to identify with ourselves, and
to understand that we need to create
a nation.

We can create a thought, an idea,
and we can create our own economy
You don't hear of any "yellow power-
running around anywhere. Because
they base their power around their
church, their house, their community.
TTiey sell Coca Cola, but their profits
go to their own people, you see, so
mat they have an economic base We
are strangers in our own church. We
have got gachupin [traditional term of
contempt for Spaniards who ruled Mexi
co for 400 years] priests from Spain
in our communities, telling us vamm
a hechar unos quatros pesos en la
canasta [let's throw four pesos in the
collection dish). And then he tells you
m y° ur religious leader," and he tries
to tell you how to eat, where to go

who to sleep with and how to do it
nght- while he's copping everything
else out. You know, we're tired of this
land of leadership.

You have to understand that we can
take over the institutions within our
community. We have to create the com-
munity of the Mexicano here in order
to have any type of power. As much
as the young ladies have created power
in their own community. But they have
to share it with the rest of us. They have
to be able to bring it together. And we
are glad when they sit down instead
of retreating. It means that we're all
one people. It means that we're all
one Raza and that we will work to-
gether and we will walk out of here in
a positive fashion.

And then you have to think positive
Don t think it can't be done. If you
think negative you won't get across
the street. You think positive, because
it only takes a minority to begin to
win over and move a majority. It onlv
took Pancho Villa and seven men to
cross El Rio Bravo and end up with
a hundred thousand men in Mexico
City. It only took Castro 82 men, and
they killed all but 15, and 15 men took
a nation. It only takes an idea and a
philosophy to carry it through, and if
the philosophy is written with the blood
of martyrs, it cannot be erased, and we
can become a free people. Thank you

Why Chica

On Nov. 13 and 14, 1969, a Chicano
symposium was held at California State
College, Hay ward. Froben Lozada
chairman of the Latin American Studies
Department at Merritt College, Oakland
and the Socialist Workers P art y can-
didate for attorney general in Califor-
nia, was one of the speakers. [ n his
talk, he outlined the nature of the spe-
cial studies department at Merritt which
is completely controlled by the students
themselves. The following is an abbre-
viated transcript of his speech.

* * *

I have been asked to speak on the
relevancy of the Chicano Studies De-

io Sfudies?

by Froben Lozada

partment at Merritt College to the Chi-
cano movement, to point out how Chi-
cano Studies relates to the Chicano
movement.

As a rule I'd look at universities,
including Cal. State Hayward, as noth-
ing but brothels where people sell their
minds instead of their bodies. (ap -
p ause) For example, we know the com-

R«l y , , Un ,i versit y of California at
Berkeley which is only one of the many
universities that do intensive research
tor wars, armaments, defoliants and
everything of that SO rt. They also do
intensive research for the growers, for
the benefit of the growers, such as in-
venting a new grape-picking machine

They do absolutely nothing, however,
for the farm workers. They don't want
to and they won't do il.

At the Merritt College Chicano Studies
Department we have a different situa-
tion. There the staff of 12 part-time
instructors and two full-time instructors
is chosen and recommended by the stu-
dents. Not only that, the courses offered
are also determined by the students. We
make good use of the campus, hold-
ing conferences, producing leaflets, es-
tablishing a national communications
network, getting lecture fees for people
who are involved in the Chicano move-
ment so they can come and talk to our
classes.

Out of the 12 members of the staff,
three of them were busted during the
Third World Liberation strike at
Berkeley last winter. Two of them are
present here tonight: Bernardo Garcia-
Pandavenes and Antonio Camejo.

In making the courses relevant to
Chicanos we have made a very serious
effort to let them know what the nature
of the ruling class of this country is.
Some 30,000 persons dictate foreign
and domestic policy to the puppets in
Washington, Sacramento and elsewhere.

If you need confirmation of this all
you have to do is pick up Who Rules
America? written by Professor Domhoff,
or pick up The Rich and the Super
Rich by Ferdinand Lundberg and you
will get an idea of how the ruling class
works.

How can this .016 percent of the total
population run the country? They have
several tricks. One of them is racism.
Divide and rule is the name of the
game. They will divide Blacks against
Mexicans against poor whites. The rul-
ing class also divides the Mexicans
against the Mexicans and the Blacks
against the Blacks and the greater the
division the greater power they can
hold.

That's the only way they can retain
control of the power since they consti-
tute only .016 percent of the popula-
tion. They can come into Oakland and
bring in a million dollars of pie from
the Office of Economic Opportunity and
set it down there for the Blacks and
Mexicans to fight it out. And when there
was no enmity and animosity between
the two before, after the million dollars
are brought in by OEO, the Mexicans

will end up fighting the Blacks saying
"We should get $300,000." Ami tin-
Blacks will say "We should get $800,
000." Instead of fighting the man who
brought the pie in they'll end up fight
ing against each other. A very subilc
trick, (applause)

Instead of fighting the man to gel
$2,000,000 they end up fighting to gel
crumbs, the million dollars that was
brought in. And this is what the nil
ing class wants.

They're also very sneaky in divert-
ing struggles that might arise. For in-
stance, if the Mexicans in South Texas
or Southern California or anywhere
in the Southwest are inclined to fight
against the war, to oppose the Viet-
nam intervention, the rulers can very
subtly come in and divert the struggle
into trying to get more Mexicans on
the draft boards — which does absolutely
nothing to change the intervention that's
going on in Vietnam.

They get all these liberal Mexicans
fighting and shadowboxing with Frito
Bandito [a racist Mexican caricature
in a TV ad for Fritos]. They claim
to be radical and they claim to be
very courageous, because they are
struggling and fighting against Frito
Bandito, because it's an offensive ad-
vert is ment, but in the meantime, they
fail to examine the causes of racism
and the roots of racism which is strict-
ly a product of the system.

Another trick that the ruling class
uses is to always make the victim look
like a criminal. The Indians rose up
to resist and struggle against being
enslaved — they were bent on making
the Indians slaves too. The minute the
Indians fought against being put in
chains like the Black brothers, the min-
ute they rose up against it, they were
called savages! And this trick is used
time and time again.

If the Blacks rise up to fight against
the racism they face, they are quickly
labeled "violent." The ruling class very
subtly turns the tables on people.

Zapata, Pancho Villa are made to
look, in our eyes, as if they were crim-
inals, and they keep pulling that trick
on us. It's brought up to date, They
make Che Guevara look like a crirn

inal, a bandito, the same thine thev
did to Zapata.

They don't restrict it to individuals,
they make even nations look like crim-
mals, when indeed they are the vic-
tims. Cuba, a little country of 8 to
10 million people, was made to look
like it was about to take over the United
States, (applause) Simply because they
decided to have missiles on their own
iandl

The people in Washington and else-
where point the finger of accusation and
say, ^ "Fidel is trying to export revolu-
tion." In the meantime, this country con-
tinues to export counterrevolution So
they turn the tables on everything in
order to continue to deceive the people
They will say, "The Communists want
to use you; the Socialists want to use
you; they want to use the Third World
people." But these are the people who
are using us ! They talk about the "free
world," when half of Latin America is
under military dictatorship, and they
call those countries part of the "free
world." But they truly don't give a
damn who runs them, as long as they
satisfy the needs of the people in Wash-
ington.

What we're trying to do is to tell the
students at Merritt College that we
should be sick and tired of these liberals
coming in from Washington and Sacra-
mento, coming over and embracing our
leaders like Cesar Chavez and slobber-
ing all over him and kissing him and
saying, "I'm going to quit eating grapes
today." (applause) Then they get on
the United Airlines plane-which is the
same airline that kept that Black sister
from working because she was wearing
a natural - they get back on that plane
and start munching on grapes. They go
back to Washington and defend the
very same system whose Defense De-
partment has made Vietnam the third
greatest grape-consuming country in
the world! (applause)

But it is nothing new. If V ou look
back to Woodrow Wilson, he didn'l
want any Blacks in the White House.
And another man with a magic name
in liberal Democratic circles came up
and opposed a federal anti-Iynch law;
that man's name was Franklin Delano
Roosevelt.
Then we have another figure, who

said that "Asian wars should be fought
by Asian boys" — another liberal. This
liberal also said that the intervention
to Cuba was a mistake — but it was
no mistake. He only admitted that it
was a mistake after if failed, (applause)
Not only that, but this liberal Democrat
is the same one who originated the
green berets, and the same one who
established counterinsurgency forces to
go oppress brothers in the Third World
in Latin America- and that was John
h hzgerald Kennedy.

Then came another liberal Democrat
with his scare tactics, trying to scare
the people into voting for the lesser of
the two evils. See, we're not supposed
to question, we're not supposed to ask,
"Why the hell do I have to choose an
evil?" (applause) We're not supposed
to say that evil is evil and there are
no degrees to it.

Anyway, this liberal scared us into
choosing him as a lesser evil over Gold-
water. That was L, B.J.

After he gets out of the picture, an-
other liberal Democrat comes running
up who, when there were 249,999 GIs
in Vietnam, thought the war was per-
fectly moral. The minute there were
250,000 GIs in Vietnam, all of a sud-
den, overnight, the war became immor-
al. That was Mr. Eugene McCarthy,
(applause)

And we are supposed to look up to
these scums with respect for their
morals. And they have the guts to tell
to be nonviolent! (applause) And
the pacifists want us to preach morality
to them!

Another example came up recently
when this liberal Democrat swam across
the lake without even getting wet -that
was the Mary Kopechne case — with Ted
Kennedy. And we're supposed to
preach morality to these guys!

Our students at Merritt College know
that the only difference that exists be-
tween the liberal Democrats and the
conservative Republicans is that the lib-
erals can deceive the people better.

Now -very briefly^ on the staff and
how we evaluate teachers who are to
teach courses in our department. We
had a lady who came up to us and
said that she had formerly been a mem-
ber of the Fair Play for Cuba Com-

mittee. I said, "You're hired." ( applause)
And then we asked her what her major
was, and we found a course she could
teach and now she's teaching United
States relations with Mexico and Latin
America from the point of view of the
oppressed, which means the left-wing
point of view, (applause)

And Ysidro Macias, who is now in
Santa Rita [framed-up on charges that
came out of the Third World strike at
Berkeley last winter], set up the course
in Mexican-American political thought,
which includes the study of the Denver
Crusade for Justice and the Delano
farm workers' strike and Rets Tijerina
and everything else. And we Invite peo-
ple from those movements who are ac-
tively involved to come over and lec-
ture to our classes.

We have a course in music by Ber-
nardo Garcia-Pandavenes, who is an-
other of those busted during the Third
World strike. But it's not restricted to
music, because music has its protest
songs and stories. And so it's all tied
in.

In the literature courses, we look al
it from the standpoint that this is
Northern Mexico, and we select the best
novels coming out of Mexico and the
few that are beginning to come out
here, novels by Carlos Fuentes and
Jose Revueltas. Carlos Fuentes was
banned from Puerto Rico by this sys-
tem. They didn't want him to go into
Puerto Rico because he's a left-winger —
and yet they preach freedom of speech.
Jose Revueltas is now in prison in
Mexico City, accused of leading the
demonstration where 500 students were
slaughtered [Oct. 2, 1968],

We let the students know why there
must be unemployment under this sys-
tem — because it's profitable. Everything
has to do with money. As long as you
keep a large number of people unem-
ployed, you can always say, "If you
don't want to work for $2.40 an hour,
don't worry because some Black or
Mexican will." It's very profitable and
keeps the wages down.

We point out the nature of wars and
the causes of wars. We point out the
fact that Chicanos have to die in out-

rageous numbers in Vietnam, and not
only do they have to give up their
lives, but before they die they have to
eat six pounds of grapes, (applause )
So these guys are not satisfied with
injury, they have to add insult Id in
jury. This course on economic develop
ment of the Third World also will be
presenting the point of view of the Op
pressed. This is very important to the
students.

Each and every one of the students
at Merritt College will be taking part
in the antiwar march [Nov. 15] where
Corky [Gonzalez] will be one of the
speakers, along with Dolores Huerta,
because we're tired of being in the front
lines in Vietnam. The front lines that
we should be in are the front lines of
the antiwar demonstrations, (applause)
We look at the barrio differently too,
not as something confined by arbitrary
city limits determined by corrupt poli-
ticians who want you to think in no
broader terms than your own barrio,
so that you won't bother to think of
the people of the Third World as broth-
ers. We look at our barrio as one not
restricted or confined to arbitrary city
limits. Our barrio goes beyond these
fictitious city limits and extends into
the Plaza de los Tres Culturas in Mexico
City. Our barrio is projected into the
favelas in Brazil. Our barrio extends
into the jungles of Bolivia and the
jungles of Vietnam. And that's what
our barrio is! Our barrio, in fact, is
the whole world, wherever the oppressed
might be.

We furnish speakers everywhere. To-
morrow, most of the members of our
staff will fan out to take part in the
premarch demonstrations [Nov. 14],
and our students will also be with us,
so that we, the Merritt College Chicanos,
go out to let the people know that we
remember the Alamo, for the right rea-
sons, (applause) And that we have to
create two, three, four, many Alamos!
(cheers and applause) And to those
Birchers and sons of Birchers (laugh-
ter) who go around saying, "America;
love it or leave it," to them we say,
"America: change it or lose it!" (cheers,
applause)

15

A I

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Further Reading

Other books on the Chicono movement which can be ordered fro
finder Press:

North from Mexico/Carey McWillioms
La Raza: Forgotten Americans/Julian Samora
Delano; The Story of the California Grape Strike/John G, Dunne

On Latin America:
Insurgent Mexico/John Reed

The U nderdogs (Mexican Revolutionj/Mariano Azueto
Zapata: The Ideology of a Peasant Revolutionary/Robert P. Millon
Capitalism and Underdevelopment in Latin America/Andre

Gunder Frank
Hugo Blanco Must Not Die/Andre Gunder Frank
Guatemala: Occupied Country/Eduardo Galeano (cloth)
The Great Fear in Latin America/John Gerassi
Latin American Radicalism: Left and Nationalist

Movements/Irving Horowitz, Josue de Castro, John Gerassi (eds.)
Black Jacobins: Toussainf L'Ouverture and the San Domingo

Revolution/C.L.R. James

Puerto Rico; Freedom and Power in the Caribbean/Gordon K.
Lewis

Mexico '68: The Students Speak/ U. S. Committee for Justice to
Latin American Political Prisoners

LaHn America: Reform or Revolution/James Petras, Maurice
Zeitlin (eds.)

Land or Death: Hugo Blanco and the Peasant Struggle in Peru/
Frances Starr

Revolution in the Revolution? Armed Struggle and Political Struggle

m Latin America/Regis Debray
The Youth Movement and the Alienation of Society/Jose Revueilas

(write for free catalog)

PATHFINDER PRESS, INC. 873 Broadway, New York, N.Y.

wmwiMiMHTWim.w. ■ ■ i vivi.... ^ .. i